Beaded Ornaments

If you like a little extra sparkle on your Christmas tree, you’ll love these beaded ornaments!  This is the perfect ornament to make and take to an ornament exchange, and you will be the hit of the party!

Materials:

• Glass seed beads and or glass bugle beads
• Glass or plastic Christmas ornaments (any size)
• Glue: Mosaic Mercantile (mosaic tile adhesive) or Weldbond glue or any type of glue for glass
• Pipe cleaners
• Shoe box top
• Optional acrylic paint, ribbon

Directions:

Let’s talk glue first, Tacky Glue will work but will not give the holding power that a glass glue will.  Mosaic Mercantile is found in some craft stores and on line this is my favorite for this project, Weldbond is easily found in the store.  I have been making these beaded ornaments for about five years and the beads are still holding strong!  Now your first thought is just to put glue on the ornament and roll in the beads, ok that will work but will not give you a smooth single layer of beads, you will end up with a lot of beads glued together and a mess!

I found that working a small area at a time (and with some patience) the results are beautiful.  Trust me it’s worth the time.  You can use glass or plastic ornaments, I like to buy them after Christmas when they are marked down 50 to 75% off!  And it will not matter what color you buy, you can paint them with acrylic paint!  So if you buy purple ornaments paint them a new color first.

I like to cover the top cap (the hanger) with bugle beads (they are the long thin bead), but that’s me!  If you are not going to do this, glue the top cap on to the ornament.  Or wrap cap with silver or gold ribbon and glue in place!

Run a line around the cap, and place a bugle bead in glue one at a time.  Let dry.

         

Now that the top is dry, we are going to start gluing on the beads, working in small areas at a time.  The reason for this is the glue  is very sticky, so to get the smooth single layer, working in small areas and letting it dry before moving on to next area, will have the best results.

You might have noticed in the list of materials I have a shoe box top, I use it as my bead catcher!  The glass beads can bounce off (all over the floor) if you don’t keep them contained.  When I’m finished with the beads I just pour them from the box into a baggy!

Place a layer of glue 2” by 2” (small area at time) on your ornament and sprinkle or pour on the beads, gently tap off the lose ones.  With your finger or finger nail, gently pat them in place, add more if you did not get a solid coverage.  I like to hang the ornament on a pipe cleaner to dry.

    

The goal is to have a single layer of beads, so when dry it feels smooth!

    

Keep going until totally covered.

It’s easy to make designs with the beads, using the bugle bead to create a swirl and then filled in with seed beads.  Run a line of glue in a swirl or “S” shape, and place a bugle bead on one at a time.  Again glue a few “S” shapes at time, let dry and do more.  If your glue line is to thick, do not worry, the seed beads will cover up the glue.

When totally dry, add 3 green seed beads to each end of the “S” shape, and fill in with seeds beads.

If you are like me, you will want to make more than one at a time.  I find working on 4 to 6 at a time, you can keep working, by the time you finish one, another will be dry, keep going and you will have finished all them!

Seed beads and bugle bead come in so many colors, which means endless possibilities!

  

  

 

  

They look stunning on a Christmas tree, and beautiful displayed in a dish or bowl.

  

I also beaded small 1″ ornaments, and hung them from white glittered branches for a unique center piece.

For added fun, I like to make wire hooks in a “S” shape using 14 gauge colored wire!

Hope your Christmas sparkles this year!!